Adult Coloring Pages: Review

I picked up my favorite Crayola crayon color, Robin’s Egg Blue, and began drawing intricate designs, letting it take control of my imagination like I never thought coloring would do to me again. The crayon allowed me to see tigers, rollercoasters and my beloved dog.

I was six, sitting at a table in Mrs. Peggy’s Playdough-smelling kindergarten classroom. This was the last time I can remember sitting down and seeing my messy, misplaced squiggles come to life as a flower or butterfly.

Drawing as a kid was a distraction: time for my mom to clean up my spilled juice, a way to escape from my brother’s wet willies and a creative outlet for six-year-old me to swirl my hand in circles until I was satisfied with my work of art.

Now as a sophomore in high school, I’m constantly in need of a stress reliever. Looking for a way out of the homework, woes and struggles of school, I stumbled across adult coloring pages on Twitter where it quickly gained popularity by the second. The pages are filled with such detailed designs that I almost thought I would make it look worse if I colored it in. I immediately was attracted to an image of an elephant, looking like it had just been painted for a festival in India.

This adult “scribbling” would be something I would spend more of my Tuesday nights doing. I couldn’t get enough of the throwback to my childhood, where I didn’t worry about anything but my Dora The Explorer Band-Aid peeling off.

Adult coloring pages come in huge varieties; most of them have extreme detail and designs in them. Looking at these as a six-year-old, I would have no clue what to do with my crayons.

I printed it out off of one of the countless websites dedicated to this stress reducer. I ignored the chemistry lab I was planning to put off until at least 11:30. I dusted off my torn 24-pack of Crayola’s and began filling in the lines and swirls of the elephant. It was becoming something beautiful, something I would actually be proud of if my mom hung it on our fridge.

The abundant online pages allow creativity without having to think too hard about it and soon my “Mango Tango” crayon was snapped in half. Full coloring books are sold at places like Urban Outfitters, and I can see why they are so popular. They help you relax and bring you back to the days of only caring about when snack time was.